[R] Noob question re: writing while loops on one line

[John McKown]

On Sun, Feb 15, 2015 at 9:54 AM, Duncan Murdoch <murdoch.duncan at gmail.com>
wrote:

> On 15/02/2015 10:08 AM, Sun Shine wrote:
> > Thanks John: understanding it as a line return makes sense!
>
> But it's not right.  This is one statement, and it returns the value 3:
>
> 1 +
> 2
>
> This is an error:
>
> 1 + ; 2
>
> The semicolon is a statement separator, not a line return.
>

​Technically speaking a semicolon is a statement terminator, not a
statement separator. In the case of the R language, that is a "nit". In the
case of Pascal, it is a big difference.


>
> Duncan Murdoch
>
>
​This is one reason why I _always_ use the semi-colon. It is _never_ really
wrong to do so. It may be _unnecessary_ in some case. It is also why I
always use <- as the assignment operator (well, that and because I like it
from my APL background). If there are two ways to express something, and
one of them is _always_ correct whereas the other _might not_ be correct in
some cases, then I think doing the former is simply "better form". But,
then, I'm anal about other things to. And that doesn't apply to interactive
use. I don't terminate my interactive statements with a semi-colon all the
time. Just most of the time. Of course, I'm a touch typist too and so it is
not really much of a problem for me.​



-- 
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Maranatha! <><
John McKown

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